Alfred van der Smissen

Alfred van der Smissen (1 February 1823-16 June 1895) was a Belgian Baron who served in the army of Austria-Hungary and commanded the Belgian Legion in the French Intervention war of 1862-1867.

Biography
Van Der Smissen entered military service in 1843, and participated in the 1851 suppression of an Algerian tribal revolt. In 1864 he commanded a Belgian corps called the Belgian Foreign Legion in the French Intervention in Mexico, with the goal of protecting Leopold II of Belgium's sister and the Empress of Mexico Charlotte of Belgium. It is speculated that he had an affair with her and had a child named Maxime Weygand, who fought in the Second World War. On 11 April 1865 his legion fought Mexican Republicans for the first time, and in 1868 was awarded the Knight's Cross of the Austrian Order of Leopold for his services in the war. In 1886, as a Lieutenant General, he suppressed a Charleroi worker strike, and in 1889 he retired and wrote memoirs of the war in Mexico.